Utah Utes football: Offense outshines defense at scrimmage

SALT LAKE CITY — Utah coach Kyle Whittingham had mixed feelings about Thursday morning's scrimmage at Rice-Eccles Stadium.

"Everything's a double-edged sword. Everything you do is a double-edged sword," Whittingham said. "The offense goes 78 snaps without turning the ball over. Fantastic. Our defense goes 78 snaps without getting a takeaway. That's awful. So how can you win?"

After a slow start that included dropped passes, several sacks and an illegal-procedure penalty, the offense bounced back to shine in the first of three scheduled scrimmages in camp.

"They got in sync and performed very well the rest of the way," Whittingham said while noting that much of the success came with the ones and twos.

Quarterbacks Terrance Cain and Jordan Wynn each threw a pair of touchdown passes to lead the outburst. Cain completed 14 of 16 passes for 184 yards, while Wynn was 14 of 20 for 160.

Third-stringer Griff Robles was three of five for 31 yards and a score. He also rushed for 29 yards and a touchdown.

Running back Tauni Vakapuna reached the end zone on a 92-yard run and wound up finishing with 123 yards on seven carries. Eddie Wide also had a solid outing, netting 67 yards on four attempts, including a 17-yard touchdown run.

The air attack featured 10 players with receptions. Reggie Dunn and Griff McNabb led the way with six catches each. Other highlights include two touchdown grabs by tight end Brad Clifford and a 53-yard scoring strike from Wynn to Shaky Smithson.

"We came together, started making plays and executing. We just need to start like that," Wynn said. "That's something we've tried to work on — being consistent — and obviously, we need to keep working on it."

Co-offensive coordinator Aaron Roderick acknowledged it.

"We've just got to be a team that starts faster," he said, noting there were a lot of positives in the scrimmage. "We started slow, but we handled the situations well. We did a good job in the situational work."

Roderick was pleased with the offense's work in the red zone, two-minute drill and backup situations. He also liked their clock and scoreboard awareness.

"We learned a lot," Roderick said. "We had some young players step up."

Dunn, he said, was one of the young players who performed as well in the scrimmage as he has in practice.